2. SHOW
WHEREIN THE EXPERIENCE AND OUTWARD LIFE OF SAINTS AND SINNERS MAY
AGREE.

3. WHEREIN
THEY MUST DIFFER.

1.
Introductory remarks.

(1.) In
ascertaining what are, and what are not, evidences of
regeneration, we must constantly keep in mind what is not, and
what is regeneration; what is not, and what is implied in it.

(2.) We must
constantly recognize the fact, that saints and sinners have
precisely similar constitutions and constitutional
susceptibilities, and therefore that many things are common to
both.

(3.) What is
common to both cannot, of course, be an evidence of regeneration.

(4.) That no
state of the sensibility has any moral character in itself. That
regeneration does not consist in, or imply, any physical change
whatever, either of the intellect, sensibility, or the faculty of
will.

(5.) That the
sensibility of the sinner is susceptible of every kind and degree
of feeling that is possible to saints.

(6.) The same
is true of the consciences of both saints and sinners, and of the
intelligence generally.

(7.) That
moral character belongs to the ultimate intention.

(8.) That
regeneration consists in a change of the ultimate intention.

(9.) That the
moral character is as the ultimate intention is.

(10.) The
inquiry is, What are evidences of a change in the ultimate
intention? What is evidence that benevolence is the ruling choice,
preference, intention of the soul?

This, it
would seem, must be a plain question, and must admit of a very
easy and satisfactory answer.

It is a plain
question, and demands, and may have, a plain answer. But so much
error prevails as to the nature of regeneration, and,
consequently, as to what are evidences of regeneration, that we
need patience, discrimination, and perseverance, and withal
candour to get at the truth upon this subject.

2. Wherein
the experience and outward life of saints and sinners may
agree.

It is plain
that they may be alike; in whatever does not consist in, or
necessarily proceed from, the attitude of their will, that is, in
whatever is constitutional or involuntary. For example--

(1). They may
both desire their own happiness. This desire is constitutional,
and, of course, common to both saints and sinners.

(2.) They may
both desire the happiness of others. This also is constitutional,
and of course common to both saints and sinners. There is no moral
character in these desires, any more than there is in the desire
for food and drink. That men have a natural desire for the
happiness of others, is evident from the fact that they manifest
pleasure when others are happy, unless they have some selfish
reason for envy, or unless the happiness of others is in some way
inconsistent with their own. They also manifest uneasiness and
pain when they see others in misery, unless they have some selfish
reason for desiring their misery.

(3.) Saints
and sinners may alike dread their own misery, and the misery of
others. This is strictly constitutional and has therefore no moral
character. I have known that very wicked men, and men who had been
infidels, when they were convinced of the truths of Christianity,
manifested great concern about their families and about their
neighbours; and, in one instance, I heard of an aged man of this
description who, when convinced of the truth, went and warned his
neighbours to flee from the wrath to come, avowing at the same
time his conviction, that there was no mercy for him, though he
felt deeply concerned for others. Such like cases have repeatedly
been witnessed. The case of the rich man in hell seems to have
been one of this description, or to have illustrated the same
truth. Although he knew his own case to be hopeless, yet he
desired that Lazarus should be sent to warn his five brethren,
lest they also should come to that place of torment. In this case,
and in the case of the aged man just named, it appears that they
not only desired that others should avoid misery, but they
actually tried to prevent it, and used the means that were in
their reach to save them. Now it is plain that this desire took
control of their will, and, of course, the state of the will was
selfish. It sought to gratify desire. It was the pain and dread of
seeing their misery, and of having them miserable, that led them
to use means to prevent it. This was not benevolence, but
selfishness. It no doubt increases the misery of sinners in hell
to have their number multiplied, that is, they being moral agents,
cannot but be unutterably pained to behold the wretchedness around
them. This may, and doubtless will, make up a great part of the
misery of devils and of wicked men, the beholding to all eternity
the misery which they have occasioned. They will not only be
filled with remorse, but undoubtedly their souls will be
unutterably agonized with the misery they will behold around them.

Let it be
understood, then, that as both saints and sinners constitutionally
desire, not only their own happiness, but also the happiness of
others, they may alike rejoice in the happiness and safety of
others, and in converts to Christianity, and may alike grieve at
the danger and misery of those who are unconverted. I well
recollect, when far from home, and while an impenitent sinner, I
received a letter from my youngest brother, informing me that he
was converted to God. He, if he was converted, was, as I supposed,
the first and only member of the family who then had a hope of
salvation. I was at the time, and both before and after, one of
the most careless sinners, and yet on receiving this intelligence,
I actually wept for joy and gratitude, that one of so prayerless a
family was likely to be saved.

Indeed, I
have repeatedly known sinners to manifest much interest in the
conversion of their friends, and express gratitude for their
conversion, although they had no religion themselves. These
desires have no moral character in themselves. In as far as they
control the will, the will yielding to impulse instead of the law
of the intelligence, this, is selfishness.

(4.) Saints
and sinners may agree in desiring their own sanctification and the
sanctification of others. Both may desire their own sanctification
as the condition of their salvation. They may also desire the
sanctification of others, as the condition of their salvation.

(5.) Saints
and sinners may both desire to be useful, as a condition of their
own salvation.

(6.) They may
also desire that others should be useful, as a condition of their
salvation.

(7.) They may
both desire to glorify God, as a means or condition of their own
salvation.

(8.) They may
also desire to have others glorify God, as a means of their
salvation. These desires are natural and constitutional, when the
salvation either of ourselves or others is felt to be important,
and when these things are seen to be conditions of salvation.

(9.) They may
both desire, and strongly desire, a revival of religion and the
prosperity of Zion, as a means of promoting their own salvation,
or the salvation of their friends. Sinners have often been known
to desire revivals of religion.

(10.) They
may agree in desiring the triumph of truth and righteousness, and
the suppression of vice and error, for the sake of the bearings of
these things on self and friends. These desires are constitutional
and natural to both, under certain circumstances. When they do not
influence the will, they have in themselves no moral character;
but when they influence the will, their selfishness takes on a
religious type. It then manifests zeal in promoting religion. But
if desire, and not the intelligence, controls the will, it is
selfishness notwithstanding.

(11.) Moral
agents constitutionally approve of what is right, and disapprove
of what is wrong. Of course, both saints and sinners may both
approve of and delight in goodness. I can recollect weeping at an
instance of what, at the time, I supposed to be goodness, while,
at the same time, I was not religious myself. I have no doubt that
wicked men, not only often are conscious of strongly approving the
goodness of God, but that they also often take delight in
contemplating it. This is constitutional, both as it respects the
intellectual approbation, and also as it respects the feeling of
delight. It is a great mistake to suppose that sinners are never
conscious of feelings of complacency and delight in the goodness
of God. The Bible represents sinners as taking delight in drawing
near to him. "Yet they seek me daily, and delight to know my ways,
as a nation that did righteousness, and forsook not the ordinance
of their God: they ask of me the ordinances of justice; they take
delight in approaching to God."--Isa. lviii. 2. "And lo, thou art
unto them as a very lovely song of one that hath a pleasant voice,
and can play well on an instrument: for they hear thy words, but
they do them not."--Ezek. xxxiii. 32. "For I delight in the law of
God after the inward man."--Rom. vii. 22.

(12.) Saints
and sinners may alike not only intellectually approve, but have
feelings of deep complacency in the characters of good men,
sometimes good men of their own time and of their acquaintance,
but more frequently good men either of a former age, or, if of
their own age, of a distant country. The reason is this: good men
of their own day and neighbourhood are very apt to render them
uneasy in their sins; to annoy them by their faithful reproofs and
rebukes. This offends them, and overcomes their natural respect
for goodness. But who has not observed the fact that good and bad
men unite in praising, admiring, and loving,--so far as feeling is
concerned--good men of by-gone days, or good men at a distance,
whose life and rebukes have annoyed the wicked in their own
neighbourhood? The fact is, that moral agents, from the laws of
their being, necessarily approve of goodness wherever they witness
it. And when not annoyed by it, when left to contemplate it in the
abstract, or at a distance, they cannot but feel a complacency in
it. Multitudes of sinners are conscious of this, and suppose that
this is a virtuous feeling. It is of no use to deny, that they
sometimes have feelings of love and gratitude to God, and of
respect for, and complacency in, good men. They often have these
feelings, and to represent them as always having feelings of
hatred and of opposition to God and to good men, is sure either to
offend them, or to lead them to deny the truths of religion, if
they are told that the Bible teaches this. Or, again, it may lead
them to think themselves Christians, because they are conscious of
such feelings as they are taught to believe are peculiar to
Christians. Or again, they may think that, although they are not
Christians, yet they are far from being totally depraved, inasmuch
as they have so many good desires and feelings. It should never be
forgotten, that saints and sinners may agree in their opinions and
intellectual views and judgments. Many professors of religion, it
is to be feared, have supposed religion to consist in desires and
feelings, and have entirely mistaken their own character. Indeed,
nothing is more common than to hear religion spoken of as
consisting altogether in mere feelings, desires, and emotions.
Professors relate their feelings, and suppose themselves to be
giving an account of their religion. It is infinitely important,
that both professors of religion and non-professors, should
understand more than most of them do of their mental constitution,
and of the true nature of religion. Multitudes of professors of
religion have, it is to be feared, a hope founded altogether upon
desires and feelings that are purely constitutional, and therefore
common to both saints and sinners.

(13.) Saints
and sinners agree in this, that they both disapprove of, and are
often disgusted with, and deeply abhor, sin. They cannot but
disapprove of sin. Necessity is laid upon every moral agent,
whatever his character may be, by the law of his being, to condemn
and disapprove of sin. And often the sensibility of sinners, as
well as of saints, is filled with deep disgust and loathing in
view of sin. I know that representations the direct opposite of
these are often made. Sinners are represented as universally
having complacency in sin, as having a constitutional craving for
sin, as they have for food and drink. But such representations are
false and most injurious. They contradict the sinner's
consciousness, and lead him either to deny his total depravity, or
to deny the Bible, or to think himself regenerate. As was shown
when upon the subject of moral depravity, sinners do not love sin
for its own sake; but they crave other things, and this leads to
prohibited indulgence, which indulgence is sin. But it is not the
sinfulness of the indulgence that was desired. That might have
produced disgust and loathing in the sensibility, if it had been
considered even at the moment of indulgence. For example: suppose
a licentious man, a drunkard, a gambler, or any other wicked man,
engaged in his favourite indulgence, and suppose that the
sinfulness of this indulgence should be strongly set before his
mind by the Holy Spirit. He might be deeply ashamed and disgusted
with himself, and so much so as to feel a great contempt for
himself, and feel almost ready, were it possible, to spit in his
own face. And yet, unless this feeling becomes more powerful than
the desire and feeling which the will is seeking to indulge, the
indulgence will be persevered in, notwithstanding this disgust. If
the feeling of disgust should for the time overmatch the opposing
desire, the indulgence will be, for the time being, abandoned for
the sake of gratifying or appeasing the feeling of disgust. But
this is not virtue. It is only a change in the form of
selfishness. Feeling still governs, and not the law of the
intelligence. The indulgence is only abandoned for the time being,
to gratify a stronger impulse of the sensibility. The will, will
of course return to the indulgence again, when the feelings of
fear, disgust, or loathing subside. This, no doubt, accounts for
the multitudes of spurious conversions sometimes witnessed.
Sinners are convicted, fears awakened, and disgust and loathing
excited. These feelings for the time become stronger than their
desire for their former indulgences, and consequently they abandon
them for a time, in obedience, not to the law of God or of their
intelligence, but in obedience to their fear, disgust, and shame.
But when conviction subsides, and the consequent feelings are no
more, these spurious converts "return like a dog to his vomit, and
like a sow that was washed to her wallowing in the mire." It
should be distinctly understood, that all these feelings of which
I have spoken, and indeed any class or degree of mere feelings,
may exist in the sensibility; and further, that these or any other
feelings may, in their turns, control the will; and produce of
course a corresponding outward life, and yet the heart be and
remain all the while in a selfish state, or in a state of total
depravity. Indeed, it is perfectly common to see the impenitent
sinner manifest much disgust and opposition to sin in himself and
in others, yet this is not principle in him; it is only the effect
of present feeling. The next day, or perhaps hour, he will repeat
his sin, or do that which, when beheld in others, enkindled his
indignation.

(14.) Both
saints and sinners approve of, and often delight in, justice. It
is common to see in courts of justice, and on various other
occasions, impenitent sinners manifest great complacency in the
administration of justice, and the greatest indignation at, and
abhorrence of, injustice. So strong is this feeling sometimes that
it cannot be restrained, but will burst forth like a smothered
volcano, and carry desolation before it. It is this natural love
of justice, and abhorrence of injustice, common alike to saints
and sinners, to which popular tumults and bloodshed are often to
be ascribed. This is not virtue, but selfishness. It is the will
giving itself up to the gratification of a constitutional impulse.
But such feelings and such conduct are often supposed to be
virtuous. It should always be borne in mind that the love of
justice, and the sense of delight in it, and the feeling of
opposition to injustice, is not only not peculiar to good men, but
that such feelings are no evidence whatever of a regenerate heart.
Thousands of instances might be adduced as proofs and
illustrations of this position. But such manifestations are too
common to need to be cited to remind any one of their existence.

(15.) The
same remarks may be made in regard to truth. Both saints and
sinners have a constitutional respect for, approbation of, and
delight in truth. Whoever knew a sinner to approve of the
character of a liar? What sinner will not resent it, to be accused
or even suspected of lying? All men spontaneously manifest their
respect for, complacency in, and approbation of truth. This is
constitutional; so that even the greatest liars do not, and
cannot, love lying for its own sake. They lie to gratify, not a
love for falsehood on its own account, but to obtain some object
which they desire more strongly than they hate falsehood. Sinners,
in spite of themselves, venerate, respect, and fear a man of
truth. They just as necessarily despise a liar. If they are liars,
they despise themselves for it, just as drunkards and debauchees
despise themselves for indulging their filthy lusts, and yet
continue in them.

(16.) Both
saints and sinners not only approve of, and delight in good men,
when, as I have said, wicked men are not annoyed by them, but they
agree in reprobating, disapproving, and abhorring wicked men and
devils. Who ever heard of any other sentiment and feeling being
expressed either by good or bad men, than of abhorrence and
indignation toward the devil? Nobody ever approved or can approve,
of his character; sinners can no more approve of it than holy
angels can. If he could approve of and delight in his own
character, hell would cease to be hell, and evil would become his
good. But no moral agent can, by any possibility, know wickedness
and approve it. No man, saint or sinner, can entertain any other
sentiments and feelings toward the devil, or wicked men, but those
of disapprobation, distrust, disrespect, and often of loathing and
abhorrence. The intellectual sentiment will be uniform.
Disapprobation, distrust, condemnation, will always necessarily
possess the minds of all who know wicked men and devils. And
often, as occasions arise, wherein their characters are clearly
revealed, and under circumstances favourable to such a result, the
deepest feelings of disgust, of loathing, of indignation, and
abhorrence of their wickedness, will manifest themselves alike
among saints and sinners.

(17.) Saints
and sinners may be equally honourable and fair in business
transactions, so far as the outward act is concerned. They have
different reasons for their conduct, but outwardly it may be the
same. This leads to the remark--

(18.) That
selfishness in the sinner, and benevolence in the saint, may, and
often do, produce, in many respects, the same results or
manifestations. For example: benevolence in the saint, and
selfishness in the sinner, may beget the same class of desires, to
wit, as we have seen, desire for their own sanctification, and for
that of others, to be useful, and to have others so; desires for
the conversion of sinners; and many such like desires.

(19.) This
leads to the remark, that, when the desires of an impenitent
person for these objects become strong enough to influence the
will, he may take the same outward course, substantially, that the
saint takes, in obedience to his intelligence. That is, the sinner
is constrained by his feelings to do what the saint does from
principle, or from obedience to the law of his intelligence. In
this, however, although the outward manifestations be the same for
the time being, yet the sinner is entirely selfish, and the saint
benevolent. The saint is controlled by principle, and the sinner
by impulse. In this case, time is needed to distinguish between
them. The sinner not having the root of the matter in him, will
return to his former course of life, in proportion as his
convictions of the truth and importance of religion subside, and
his former feelings return; while the saint will evince his
heavenly birth, by manifesting his sympathy with God, and the
strength of principle that has taken possession of his heart. That
is, he will manifest that his intelligence, and not his feelings,
controls his will.

(20.) Saints
and sinners may both love and hate the same things, but for
different and opposite reasons. For example: they may both love
the Bible; the saint benevolently, and the sinner selfishly; that
is, the saint loves the Bible for benevolent, and the sinner for
selfish, reasons. They may love Christians for opposite reasons;
the saint for their likeness to Christ, the sinner because he
considers them the favourites of Heaven, as his particular
friends, or because he, in some way, hopes to be benefited by
them, or from a mere constitutional complacency in goodness. Now
observe; the Christian may have the same constitutional feelings
as the sinner; and besides these, he may have reasons for his love
and conduct peculiar to the saint. The saint and sinner may, for
different and opposite reasons, be interested in, and deeply
affected with, the character of God, with the truth, the
sanctuary, and in all the duties of religion, and all the means of
grace. They may alike, but for different reasons, hate infidelity,
error, sin, sinners, selfishness. A selfish sinner may deeply
abhor selfishness in others, and even in himself, and still
persevere in it.

(21.) Again:
selfishness in the sinner, and benevolence in the saint, may lead
them to form similar resolutions and purposes; for example--to
serve God; to avoid all sin; to do all duty; to do right; to be
useful; to persevere in well-doing; to live for eternity; to set a
good example; to pay the strictest regard to the sabbath and to
all the institutions of religion; to do all that in them lies to
support religious institutions.

(22.) Saints
and sinners may agree in their views of doctrines and of measures,
may be equally zealous in the cause of God and religion; may be
equally well-informed; may experience delight in prayer, and in
religious meetings, and in religious exercises generally.

(23.) Both
may be greatly changed in feeling and in life.

(24.) They
may both give all their goods to feed the poor, or to support the
gospel, and send it to the heathen.

(25.) They
may both go as missionaries to the heathen, but for entirely
different reasons.

(26.) They
may have equal convictions of sin, and their sensibilities may be
similarly affected by these convictions.

(27.) They
may both have great sorrow for sin, and great loathing of self on
account of it.

(28.) They
may both have feelings of gratitude to God.

(29.) They
may both appear to manifest all the graces of true saints.

(30.) They
may both be very confident of their good estate.

(31.) They
may both have new hopes and new fears, new joys and new sorrows,
new friends and new enemies, new habits of life.

(32.) They
may both be comforted by the promises, and awed by the
threatenings.

(33.) They
may both appear to have answers to prayer.

(34.) They
may both appear and really suppose themselves to renounce the
world. They may really both renounce this world, the saint for the
glory of God, the sinner that he may win heaven.

(35.) They
may both practise many forms of self-denial. The Christian really
denies himself, and the sinner may appear to do so, by denying
certain forms of self-seeking, for the securing of a selfish
interest in another direction.

(36.) They
may both have the faith of miracles: "And though I have the gift
of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and
though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and
have not charity, I am nothing."--1 Cor. xiii. 2.

(37.) They
may both suffer martyrdom for entirely opposite reasons. "And
though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it
profiteth me nothing."--1 Cor. xiii. 3.

(38.) They
may be confident of their good estate, and may both die in
triumph, and carry their hope to the bar of God. "Then shall ye
begin to say, We have eaten and drunk in thy presence, and thou
hast taught in our streets. But he shall say, I tell you, I know
you not whence ye are: depart from me, all ye workers of
iniquity."--Luke xiii. 26, 27.

REMARKS.

1. For want
of these and such like discriminations, many have stumbled.
Hypocrites have held on to a false hope, and lived upon mere
constitutional desires and spasmodic turns of giving up the will,
during seasons of special excitement, to the control of these
desires and feelings. These spasms they call their waking up. But
no sooner does their excitement subside, than selfishness again
assumes its wonted forms. It is truly wonderful and appalling to
see to what an extent this is true. Because, in seasons of special
excitement they feel deeply, and are conscious of feeling, as they
say, and acting, and of being entirely sincere in following their
impulses, they have the fullest confidence in their good estate.
They say they cannot doubt their conversion. They felt so and so,
and gave themselves up to their feelings, and gave much time and
money to promote the cause of Christ. Now this is a deep delusion,
and one of the most common in Christendom, or at least one of the
most common that is to be found among what are called revival
Christians. This class of deluded souls do not see that they are,
in such cases, governed by their feelings, and that if their
feelings were changed, their conduct would be so, of course; that
as soon as the excitement subsides, they will go back to their
former ways, as a thing of course. When the state of feeling that
now controls them has given place to their former feelings, they
will of course appear as they used to do. This is, in few words,
the history of thousands of professors of religion.

2. This has
greatly stumbled the openly impenitent. Not knowing how to account
for what they often witness of this kind among professors of
religion, they are led to doubt whether there is any such thing as
true religion.

Again: many
sinners have been deceived just in the way I have pointed out, and
have afterwards discovered that they had been deluded, but could
not understand how. They have come to the conclusion that
everybody is deluded, and that all professors are as much deceived
as they are. This leads them to reject and despise all religion.

3. A want of
discrimination between what is constitutional and what belongs to
a regenerate state of mind, has stumbled many. Impenitent sinners,
finding themselves to have what they call certain good desires and
feelings, have either come to the conclusion that they were born
again, or that the unregenerate have at least a spark of holiness
in them, that only needs to be cherished and cultivated, to fit
them for heaven.

4. Some
exercises of impenitent sinners, and of which they are conscious,
have been denied for fear of denying total depravity. They have
been represented as necessarily hating God and all good men; and
this hatred has been represented as a feeling of malice and enmity
towards God. Many impenitent sinners are conscious of having no
such feelings; but, on the contrary, they are conscious of having
at times feelings of respect, veneration, awe, gratitude, and
affection towards God and good men. They are also conscious, that
they are often influenced by these feelings; that, in obedience to
them, they sometimes pray and sing praises to God; that they
sometimes manifest a deep veneration and respect for good men, and
show them favour, and do many things for them which they would not
do, did they not feel so deep a respect, veneration, and affection
for them. Of these, and many like things, many impenitent sinners
are often conscious. They are also often conscious of feeling no
opposition to revivals, but, on the contrary, that they rejoice in
them, and feel desirous that they should prosper, and hope that
they shall be themselves converted. They are conscious of feeling
deep veneration and respect, and even affection for those
ministers who are the agents, in the hand of God, of carrying them
forward. To this class of sinners, it is a snare and a
stumbling-block to tell them, and insist, that they only hate God,
and Christians, and ministers, and revivals; and to represent
their moral depravity to be such, that they crave sin as they
crave food, and that they necessarily have none but feelings of
mortal enmity against God. None of these things are true, and this
class of sinners know that they are not true. Such representations
either drive them into infidelity on the one hand, or to think
themselves Christians on the other. But those theologians who hold
the views of constitutional depravity of which we have spoken,
cannot consistently with their theory, admit to these sinners the
real truth, and then show them conclusively that in all their
feelings which they call good, and in all their yielding to be
influenced by them, there is no virtue; that their desires and
feelings have in themselves no moral character, and that when they
yield the will to their control, it is only selfishness.

The thing
needed is a philosophy and a theology that will admit and explain
all the phenomena of experience, and not deny human consciousness.
A theology that denies human consciousness is only a curse and a
stumbling-block. But such is the doctrine of universal
constitutional moral depravity.

It is
frequently true, that the feelings of sinners become exceedingly
rebellious and exasperated, even to the most intense opposition of
feeling toward God, and Christ, and ministers, and revivals, and
toward every thing of good report. If this class of sinners are
converted, they are very apt to suppose, and to represent all
sinners as having just such feelings as they had. But this is a
mistake, for many sinners never had those feelings. Nevertheless,
they are no less selfish and guilty than the class who have the
rebellious and blasphemous feelings which I have mentioned. This
is what they need to know. They need to understand definitely what
sin is, and what it is not; that sin is selfishness; that
selfishness is the yielding of the will to the control of feeling,
and that it matters not at all what the particular class of
feelings is, if feelings control the will, and not intelligence.
Admit their good feelings, as they call them, and take pains to
show them, that these feelings are merely constitutional, and have
in themselves no moral character. If they plead, as they often
will, that they not only feel but that they act out their
feelings, and give themselves up to be controlled by them, then
show them that this is only selfishness, changing its form, and
the will consenting for the time to seek the gratification of this
class of feelings, because they are for the time being the most
importunate and influential with the will; that as soon as another
class of feelings come into play, they will go over to their
indulgence, and leave God and religion uncared for.

The ideas of
depravity and of regeneration, to which I have often alluded, are
fraught with great mischief in another respect. Great numbers, it
is to be feared, both of private professors of religion and of
ministers, have mistaken the class of feelings of which I have
spoken, as common among certain impenitent sinners, for religion.
They have heard the usual representations of the natural depravity
of sinners, and also have heard certain desires and feelings
represented as religion. They are conscious of these desires and
feelings, and also, sometimes, when they are very strong, of being
influenced in their conduct by them. They assume, therefore, that
they are regenerate, and elected, and heirs of salvation. They are
conscious that they often have feelings of great attachment to the
world, and various classes of feeling very inconsistent with their
religious feelings, as they call them; and that when these
feelings are in exercise, they also yield to them, and give
themselves up to their control. But this they are taught to think
is common to all Christians; that all Christians have much
indwelling sin, are much of their time entirely out of the way,
and never altogether right, even for a moment, that they never
feel so much as they are capable of feeling, and often feel the
opposite of what they ought to feel. These views lull them asleep.
The philosophy and theology that misrepresent moral depravity and
regeneration thus, must, if consistent, also misrepresent true
religion; and oh! the many thousands that have mistaken the mere
constitutional desires and feelings, and the selfish yielding of
the will to their control, for true religion, and have gone to the
bar of God with a lie in their right hand.

It is a
mournful, and even a heart-rending fact, that very much that
passes current for Christian experience is not, and cannot be, an
experience peculiar at all to Christians. It is common to both
saints and sinners. It is merely the natural and necessary result
of the human constitution, under certain circumstances. Let no man
deceive himself by thinking more highly of himself than he ought
to think.

5. Another
great evil has arisen out of the false views I have been exposing,
namely:--

Many true
Christians have been much stumbled and kept in bondage, and their
comfort and their usefulness much abridged, by finding themselves,
from time to time, very languid and unfeeling. Supposing religion
to consist in feeling, if at any time the sensibility becomes
exhausted, and their feelings subside, they are immediately thrown
into unbelief and bondage. Satan reproaches them for their want of
feeling, and they have nothing to say, only to admit the truth of
his accusations. Having a false philosophy of religion, they judge
of the state of their hearts by the state of their feelings. They
confound their hearts with their feelings, and are in almost
constant perplexity to keep their hearts right, by which they mean
their feelings, in a state of great excitement.

Again: they
are not only sometimes languid, and have no pious feelings and
desires, but at others they are conscious of classes of emotions
which they call sin. These they resist, but still blame themselves
for having them in their hearts, as they say. Thus they are
brought into bondage again, although they are certain that these
feelings are hated, and not at all indulged, by them.

Oh, how much
all classes of persons need to have clearly defined ideas of what
really constitutes sin and holiness. A false philosophy of the
mind, especially of the will, and of moral depravity, has covered
the world with gross darkness on the subject of sin and holiness,
of regeneration, and of the evidences of regeneration, until the
true saints, on the one hand, are kept in a continual bondage to
their false notions; and on the other, the church swarms with
unconverted professors, and is cursed with many self-deceived
ministers.

This
file is CERTIFIED BY GOSPEL TRUTH MINISTRIES TO BE
CONFORMED TO THE ORIGINAL TEXT. For authenticity
verification, its contents can be compared to the
original file at www.GospelTruth.net
or by contacting Gospel Truth P.O. Box 6322, Orange, CA
92863. (C)2000. This file is not to be changed in any
way, nor to be sold, nor this seal to be
removed.